Dianna Booher is the bestselling author of 46 books, published in 26 languages, with nearly 4 million copies sold. Her personal development topics include leadership communication, executive presence, writing, and life balance. She has been inducted into the Speakers Hall of Fame by the National Speakers Association. Success Magazine has named her to its list of “21 Top Speakers for the 21st Century.”

Her motivation to write “What More Can I Say?”

Everybody has to persuade somebody to do something: you want to change how somebody thinks or feels, you want people to contribute to a cause, to change a bad habit or improve performance, or to close a deal. This book is written for the individual but also for someone working at a corporation. It’s full of persuasion tips, strategies and techniques.

The challenge of this century is to communicate complex ideas with clarity and civility

Because of Internet, we are more connected and everybody is saying something. What a CEO says in one part of the world can all of the sudden drop stock prices in the other side of the world. Another thing is that if you want to get the attention of people for your cause, you have to communicate better to stand out. For example: LinkedIn posts have exploded and views of every article have gone down exponentially. There are millions of people writing. The bar just keeps rising.

Distrust is a big cause of communication failures

If you don’t trust someone, you can’t get to first base because they will look at everything you say and twist it. Without trust, a neutral comment can be interpreted as negative. It depends how you trust and like a person. Inconsistency causes distrust. In order to build trust: talk the truth, explain your reasons behind your decision.

The mistake of talking very generally

This is depicted in Dianna’s “Law of Generalization Versus Specificity.” If a CEO or another leader talks too general, the message doesn’t stick and it’s confusing. The message passes through one person to another, and they all interpret it differently. The more specific, the chances are that people will all be in the same page.

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